Turkey convicts 2 of insulting the state

A week after Orhan Pamuk, Turkey's top novelist, went on trial, charged with insults to the Turkish identity, an Istanbul court convicted two other intellectuals on the same charges. Zulkuf Kisanak, who compiled stories of forced evacuations of Kurdish villages by the Turkish military in his book "Lost Villages," received a $2,200 fine. Aziz Ozer, a publisher whose magazine carried articles titled "80 Years of the Turkish Republic, 80 Years of Fascism" and "No to a Partnership of Invasion in Iraq," was fined $4,400. Turkey has revised its laws in line with European freedoms of expression, but the publication of insults to the state or army is still considered a crime.